


Sideways

by jencat



Category: Dredd (2012)
Genre: Aftermath, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Guns, Lots of guns, Stream of Consciousness, dredd being canon-typical utterly unhelpful, just saying, or the unfortunate lack of them, post traumatic everything, really you should be more careful with your rookie psychics guys, that post-Peachtrees Anderson fic that absolutely nobody asked for
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-24
Updated: 2018-02-24
Packaged: 2019-03-23 14:06:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13789305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jencat/pseuds/jencat
Summary: Anderson blows past the paramedics on a white hot wave of indignation, intent on nothing so much as getting as far away from the clusterfuck of Peachtrees as fast as she can.  They're calling after her but she's more focused on the odd weightlessness where the badge used to be - strange, seeing as it hardly weighed anything - and a distracting whine taking up the edge of her hearing.Too many grenades. And rounds. And, everything.Anderson, in the aftermath.





	Sideways

Anderson blows past the paramedics on a white hot wave of indignation, intent on nothing so much as getting as far away from the clusterfuck of Peachtrees as fast as she can. They're calling after her but she's more focused on the odd weightlessness where the badge used to be - strange, seeing as it hardly weighed anything - and a distracting whine taking up the edge of her hearing. _Too many grenades. And rounds. And, everything._

For once, the sun isn't searing her eyes even nearly enough. All night in a rat-trap maze of dark, cold corridors and the chill has worked its way into her bones out here in the heat and dust and smog. As much as her fury keeps her stalking through the mess of Judges and paramedics and recyc clogging up the entrance, it's not nearly enough to stop her shivering.

She glances back at the dark maw of the megablock, and, looking small in comparison, Dredd talking to the Chief Judge. She had managed the barest polite greeting to the woman on her way past, because nothing has still quite blown away her sanity, and she's still wearing the uniform, but it hardly _matters_ anymore. Nothing does. Worse, far worse, than not being a Judge, is the thought of trying to get by in this city doing what she can do, but without the uniform behind it. 

At the back of her mind, all of her training is trying to reassert itself as she heads back out of the sun. Everything they drill at the academy, and all the other things; the ones she relies on to keep herself in check and not drowning in the sea of voices. Something is nagging at her now, something to do with _adrenaline_ , and... something else she can't quite catch. Something making her hands shake so badly she's very glad she's not holding a weapon anymore. _Weapon. Huh._ She bites back a snicker at that; always with the fucking gun today. Such a simple equation, really: _Anderson loses gun = automatic fail. Anderson's gun blows up in the hand of the fuckwit drug dealer who took the gun in the first place, and saves her fucking life._

And now there's just another empty space where the weapon used to be. She's all out of everything: no more ammo; the replacement weapon she'd snagged on her way out of MaMa's level that first time still lying somewhere on the floor where-- where--

There's that whine again, something like the noise the Lawgiver makes when it's cycling up. Her brain's stuttering; caught up in a rat-trap cycle of _not thinking about that right now_ and so long as she keeps walking, none of it can catch up with her.

The bike is still sitting there, where she left it, but she can't quite bring herself to do anything other than pick up the helmet and lug it away with her. _Well. Not much point putting it on now._ She's faintly aware of a disquieting buzz in her hands beneath the gloves; leftover vibrations from squeezing the trigger again and again and again; the kick and shudder of the recoil; the wet sound of flesh caving beneath the bullet. A woman's face, disbelieving and defiant... She swallows down a sharp sudden wave of nausea.

She's looking dead ahead, so focused on the bright square of light of the street that it takes a minute to register that someone is standing in her way. Someone very tall and... well, really she's very tired of seeing that grim-set expression by now, because it feels like it's all she's been seeing for the last fuck-knows-how-many hours. Even in the elevator just now; even back when he was patching up--

And there's that _noise_ again.

She deliberately doesn't look up, and if it's perhaps accompanied by a slightly nauseating flash of _standing propped up in an elevator, looking/not looking at that visor while-_

She shakes her head sharply, once, like it will dislodge the memory. Something in her side twinges instead; it's too bright out here, she can't quite catch her breath--

But she's damned if she's going to stop walking now. She does slow down, barely, because it's habit; because she isn't entirely sure quite how insubordinate she can still get away with being. Plus, the whole part where she just saved his life and then he _fucking failed her assessment-_

Because of the gun. Because she lost her weapon, and it blew up and took someone's _arm off with it--_

"Anderson."

It's an acknowledgement, rather than a greeting. Like he wasn't waiting for her, and he's not moving; _definitely_ not about to fall into step with her. She grits her teeth and stops, because, well. It's getting harder to keep moving anyway -- _just tired, is all, and pissed at not passing, and--_

He's holding something out to her; she can barely see in the dim light, catching the barest edge of the morning sun, but there's a dull gleam of brass there. For a second, she smells smoke and snow in the air, and the shape coalesces into the familiar lines of her name; her badge. She misses the fit of the gun in her hand to go with it with a sudden, fierce ache.

She stares at it dumbly for a moment without moving, without reaching for it; tries to take a deep breath but something catches and she has to swallow back a cough. "I don't... understand?"

It's possible he shrugs. She really wouldn't put anything past Dredd. Like it's the most obvious thing in the world right now. "Your badge. It was a pass."

She reaches for it with numb fingers, trying to fit the shape of it back into memory. She has an inkling the only words coming out of her mouth should be _thank you, sir_ but she's possibly a little punchy right now, with the lack of sleep and the blood loss-- "What happened to that automatic fail?"

She thinks he may even have blinked, behind the visor. It's hard to tell, she's clutching the badge so tight her knuckles must be white beneath the gloves, and the world is starting to slip sideways. She wonders if that's what Slomo is like; this hazy lack of focus, but honestly she doesn't need time to stretch any more right now; it already feels syrupy; thick and slow.

There's a moment where he seems to be considering what to say, and she remembers a few hours back; stuck out on a ledge scattered with bewildered kids and her ears still ringing from the sound of the guns shredding walls and _people._ Hearing _we've got nowhere to go_ , gulping smoky breaths of cold air while she tries to parse his expression. And remembering it looked like the closest to something like pity she'd had that entire night from anyone.

"Extenuating circumstances", she hears, and she thinks _damn right, you miserable fucker,_ and also _we did that; we survived it._

He's frowning when she looks up, still trying to work out how to reattach her badge with fingers that won't work. Nods abruptly, and mutters "Recommend you get that treated," before he turns and walks away.

And she remembers the shot; of course she does. Remembers the world falling sideways, and the gaping wound in her side that had only barely been patched up with a field dressing, and that field dressing apparently includes a truly excellent local anaesthetic and a metric fucktonne of painkillers in there somewhere, _and why had nobody in the Academy ever mentioned_ that quite this much medication is a bad idea for someone as psychic as she is.

She gives up on fastening the badge, lets her hand drop to that odd numbness in her side. There's a moment where reality still doesn't quite kick in, and she's still trapped back there in someone else's bad dream, turning their mind inside out for the sake of the badge. _Her_ badge. Recognising that line between _thinking about hurting me_ and that part where some stranger she didn't even see coming; couldn't picture their face or name-- _that_ was who put a bullet in her, and no matter how busy she had been putting everyone else in that room down, she hadn't been able to do a damn thing to stop it. 

Then she's back outside, clutching her helmet and her badge and watching Dredd disappear out of the shadow of the block.

She blinks in the sun, and looks around for the paramedics.

**Author's Note:**

> It just makes me cackle so freaking much that Dredd only tells the Chief Judge that Anderson is a pass after he watches her storm past the paramedics and refuse treatment for, um, that gaping gunshot wound. Because apparently they are both idiots who just got shot in the stomach and that field dressing contains some seriously good drugs.
> 
> (Um, yup, this film is my ultraviolent happy place and I've seen it approximately twelve thousand times, but there you go).


End file.
